without one
by p and b
Summary: Kain doesn't have one-no destiny. He's not a chosen child, not one of the Professor's own. Still, he struggles on, and someday, even without a future, without a destiny, he'll make it too. sinnoh world m/ slash


Hello! We are an rp-ing duo-I'm P, and the other lovely lady is B. Normally we don't write OCs into an established world-we both find OCs tend to be rather Mary Sueish, but this time we decided to try something different, so here we are! Enjoy :) We tried to keep it as close to the game as possible.

* * *

"I'm off, Mom!" he called, closing the door behind him carefully. His mother always got pissy when he slammed the front door; she said it made her (seemingly ever-present) migraine worse. Like hell. With a half-hearted sigh, he shoved his hands into his pockets and began the trek down Route 201 to Professor Rowan's lab, eager to get away from the house and his nagging mother.

It wasn't so bad in Twinleaf Town, he had to admit. It was quiet and the residents were relatively mellow, with the exception of his mother. Fortunately, he managed to stay out of the house for most of the day under the pretense of going to play with the other kids (fortunately, she never noticed that there _were_ no other kids).

For years and years, he spent his days napping by the lake and watching the clouds, avoiding the persistant nagging of his mother and the curious gazes of the townsfolk. The day his older sister went on her adventure was the day that routine stopped, and a new one began. The moment he saw her with that friendly little Chimchar, he knew he'd found his dream.

'Except,' he thought, pulling out a shiny red pokeball from his bag, 'I've found a way to beat the system.' He had never understood why the boys and girls who lived in Twinleaf Town always received special, rare Pokemon, or why people always viewed the children from there as inherently talented. It never quite stuck right with him, so for his ninth birthday he'd begged his older sister for one thing, and one thing only.

A pokeball.

With a small smile, he tossed the pokeball into the air, catching it as a Starly fluttered out from its confines. As small as it was, the act of rebellion caused pride to blossom warm in his chest, and a small smile spread on his face as he looked over to his first partner. Not a fire, water, or grass type, but a flying-type.

Sometimes, Kain is very, very proud of his symbolism.

After ages of trotting through tall grass (he'd discarded the repel his mother gave him before he left) and fending off wild pokemon, at last Kain emerged from the final patch of tall grass, rushing into Sandjem Town with the single-minded goal of reaching the Pokemon center.

"Ah, you must be Kain!" A friendly voice greeted him, and a strong hand on his shoulder stopped him in his tracks. "You're the new trainer from Twinleaf Town, yes?" A man in a lab coat smiled at him, waiting for his response. He nodded slowly, glancing nervously over at the bright red building on his right.

"How was your trip here? Safe, I presume?" With an impatient sound, Kain twisted out of the man's grip and made a dash for the Pokemon center, cradling the pokeball on his belt. He ignored the shout of confusion from behind him, instead concentrating on the glass sliding door which was his target. Three yards away... three feet away... three _inches_...

"Would you happen to be Kain?" The boy looked up suddenly, nearly clipping the man in the chin with the back of his head. Pity he missed. Eyes narrowed, Kain stared up at him, shifting testily in his seat as he inspected the elderly man standing awkwardly in front of him. Perhaps choosing a seat near the back of the center wasn't the best idea, since it was the farthest away from the entrance.

"What if I am?" he replied in a low voice. The man smiled warmly, not breaking eye contact for even an instant.

"I just want to talk," he said, gesturing at the seat next to Kain's. "Can I sit?" Kain mumbled his disapproval, but the man sat down anyway.

"Why did you run away when the scientist from our lab greeted you?" The question was met with silence, so the man sat back patiently in his seat, waiting for an answer.

"This whole thing is stupid," Kain announced finally. The man's eyebrow rose with interest. "I don't want your rare, special Pokemon. I don't want your charity, I don't want your Pokedex, and I sure as hell don't want to owe you anything. I don't know what you expect from me, but I'm not gonna become a pawn in your stupid little _game_, Professor Rowan." Rowan's expression remained exceptionally steady at the accusation.

"Starly and I are just fine on our own," he growled. "I'm not my sister. I don't wanna be involved in this whole thing. Just... just leave us alone." With a furtive glance thrown at the professor, Kain stood up, shuffling over to the front desk to retrieve his pokeball. After thanking Nurse Joy, he made a beeline to the exit, leaving a slightly stunned Professor Rowan to contemplate what had just occurred.

* * *

Jenson thought Roark was off his rocker.

Well, fine, everyone thought Roark was off his rocker, but Jenson most of all. _Lift this heavy boulder_, the man said, and then proceeded to use his precious Cranidos to do the work for him. Well, that's all very well and good, Jenson thought bitterly, but _what if he didn't have a rock pokemon_? He looked around. All the men (from the nearby Jublife or Mt. Coronet) had their own Machops and Geodudes, commanding them as they saw fit; Jenson alone was left with his hands and the strength of his back.

Grunting, Jenson shifted his position slightly, so that he wasn't being distracted by the rock jutting into his hip and heaved, trying to balance the weight without throwing his back out-many men had to return home empty-handed because they were too flippant with their own strength. Slowly, legs and shoulders straining, he lifted the boulder, inch by inch into his cart.

"Hey, J!"

"Yeah, Carter?" Jenson gasped back, collapsed by the side of his wooden cart and groping blindly for his towel and water.

A shadow fell over him. "Bro," Carter said. "You really need to catch a fighting pokemon, or at least a ground or rock."

Jenson snorted. "Yeah. Sure."

Carter swung himself up to perch on Jenson's cart. "So, don't you want to know what it is I've got to tell you?"

"No," Jenson said wryly, "but you're going to tell me anyway."

"Damn straight," Carter snorted. "At any rate, just came to let you know—Roark's coming to check the mines today."

Jenson narrowed his eyes. "Excuse me?"

"He's coming to check the mines-"

Jenson slamming his water bottle down made Carter jump. "Of _course_ he is."

Carter rolled his eyes. "Yeah, Roark's crazy, but what can you do? I know your 'rents are all the way in Sunnyshore, but we gotta do what we gotta do, man."

Jenson snarled quietly. He wasn't angry per se, but he wasn't really pleased either. "I still can't believe Roark's coming to check on _progress_-on a Tuesday! Tuesday! It's always Friday! What is this; a sweatshop? We make the quotas just fine!"

"Kid," Carter began, and Jenson hated that tone of voice, he really did; it only served to remind him of all from which he had run, "you gotta remember that Roark's got higher ups too. Maybe they're not happy with the stuff we make."

Jenson flung the towel from his shoulder onto the bar of the cart. "Well," he said, "we want to give Roark a good showing then."

Carter grinned. "Atta boy."

Flipping Carter the bird, Jenson turned his back towards the wall, scrutinizing what the best place to start digging would be. Having just moved the boulder away from a limestone deposit, that seemed like the most viable place to start. Limestone was soft, and a bitch to breathe, but easy to carry, and for now, it would have to do.

Carter, for all his blasé, was very calm during and after the proceedings. Jenson and Roark, however, were not, and after the meeting, Jenson pulled Carter aside.

"Did he seem jumpy to you? He seemed jumpy to me. Maybe a little too jumpy. Jumpier than usual."

Carter snorted. "You're crazy."

"Yeah, well, that's what inhaling three tons of limestone dust will do to you," Jenson said. "You think Roark is in trouble?"

"Nah," Carter said. "I bet he's got somethin' on his mind, though." He tapped his forehead in a meaningful manner.

"All kinds of crazy is what he's got on his mind." Jenson paused. "How close are we to the quota?"

"Not so far now. Just a handful more, and we'll make it by the end of this week."

Jenson closed his eyes. "Like usual, huh?"

Jenson used to dream big. Like every other damn kid in this damn place, he wanted to be the best of the best; wanted to be the guy to take down the arrogant Elite and show them what a kid from a backwater shithole could do. But it didn't work out that way. Somehow he ended up here, in Oreburg (so maybe it wasn't 'somehow' because he did know but he didn't want to remember) hauling rocks for the rest of his life.

Fucking depressing.

But that was fine, for now. He was young, and he was still free-some of these men, like Carter, had wives and children to support. They couldn't leave now, and they wouldn't leave until their bodies were the ones leaving the mine in wheelbarrows. He swore to himself for the thousandth time, _I will get out of here._

Jenson lived in an apartment complex with Carter and Steve, both of whom had their own families.

He hated it.

It wasn't that he hated Carter or Steve, because he didn't, and it wasn't that he didn't like their families, either, because Emma made the best chocolate pies in existence; it was just that he felt like a moocher. Hell, he was a moocher, even though he paid rent and babysat Carter's and Steve's children sometimes. Those two deserved their own families-without him gatecrashing the party.

Still, what else was there to do? He was too old to receive the kind of assistance younger trainers received on their coming-of-age journeys, and too young to properly make his way in the world as something greater, hence the working-for-Roark thing.

As much as Jensen whined about it, he really did admire Roark. That man-no, that kid, really, had the guts to leave home and make his way as a gym leader, and a powerful first leader at that. Jenson had only witnessed one traveling trainer beat the man, and he had been at the gym for a few years now.

Jenson himself could, of course, beat the guy black and blue, and with their fighting pokemon, so could half the other miners, but they never did. There was a tentative respect between the workers and the owner. Something a little bit like love and a lot like desperateness, but mostly, Jenson thought ruefully, it was the sorrow of a chance gone past.

* * *

Jenson awoke in the dark.

He hated the dark.

Sort of counterproductive to working in the mines, though, so he usually toughed it out. He had to. Without a fighting type or a rock or ground type, it took him much longer than the other guys to finish his portion of the work, lengthening his work hours to long past moon-high. Normally he didn't mind; he enjoyed the silence and his own pokemon was something of a night owl anyway, but the dark still crept up his spine and screamed in his ears like a lover long lost.

Jenson struggled to his feet. Only two more average-sized boulders to go before morning, or so he hoped. It might very well be morning already and he didn't know it. He found that time died in the dark, and the only thing that kept him running was the state of his cart-empty meant eight AM, and completely full meant ten. After emptying the cart, he ran again, this time until noon, and they broke for luncheon. The five-and-a-half full meant Carter was done, and seventh full usually meant twelve-AM, and he could return to his shared apartment.

There were those days, though, like that day, where he was so tired he couldn't finish his quota before dropping dead on his feet and had to add the unfinished cart to the morning's work.

"Come on, Jenson," he said to the empty room. "Let's do this."

Eight-AM found him lightly snoozing by his now-empty cart.

Carter prodded him in the arm. "Jay. Jay. Jenson. Jay. Jay. Jay. Jenson."

"What!" Jenson scrambled to his feet, spitting and hissing. "Jesus, Carter! Ever hear of _not a morning person_?"

"Ever hear of 'morning breath,' Jay?" Carter smirked. "You spent the night in the cave again. You have some kind of hot mistress in here that you haven't told us about or something?"

"I wish," Jenson muttered, rubbing his bicep absently.

Carter clapped the younger man on the back. "Wash up," he said. "Roark wants us in ten."

"Shit, really?"

"Yeah. Run."

Jenson ran.

Carter's apartment wasn't so far from the Oreburg mine, but far enough that Jenson was embarrassed about his bedraggled state. He really did look like he rolled around with someone in the mines. How disgusting.

Throwing himself through the door, he barely managed half a greeting to Emma and Carly, who were cleaning away the breakfast dishes, before sprinting up the stairs, two to a step, to his shower-the only part of the house that was actively _his_. Carter and his family had their bath, Steve and his family had theirs, but this tiny shower tucked away into the corner was _his_, _Jenson's_.

Of course, this addition was more out of necessity than any fondness on Carter's part; Jenson liked to take showers up to an hour long, and in a house with more than six people and only two bathrooms, it became rather a problem. Thus, Jenson saved up to buy his own damn shower. And he loved it.

He stripped out of his clothes and tossed them across the room onto his cot, muttering, "Cold, cold, cold," hopping from one foot to the other as he waited for the water to warm. Working in the mines might have done wonders for his skinny frame, he thought, but there was something to be said for a layer of fat. Maybe he should steal tiny Suzie's lunch when Emma wasn't looking.

Jenson leapt into the tiny cubicle as soon as steam touched the glass, unwilling to wait any longer for the promise of cleanliness-Carter made fun of his anal obsession with keeping his hands relatively free of dirt, saying that as much of a 'real man' as Jenson was, he couldn't keep the woman out of him. Jenson told Carter to fuck off.

Methodically washing his hair and wincing at how tight his back felt Jenson contemplated the physics of orchestrating a massive cave-in and potentially crushing Carter's tongue. Maybe radioactive spiders could be added for extra precautions. Yes, Jenson thought, radioactive spiders sounded fine. He had it on good authority that Carter screamed like a little girl anywhere near the eight-legged creatures. Pity, that. Jenson rather liked them.

"Hey, Jay!" Carly shouted up the stairs. "You've got a meeting in one minute, and you know how Roark is about being late!"

"What!" Jenson cursed forgetting to put a clock in the bathroom once again. Preferably inside the shower stall.

Carly laughed. "Sorry, Jay," she said, not sounding sorry at all (Emma, Jenson liked Emma better), "but I didn't know you were rushing back for a shower."

"What are you talking about?" Emma said then. "Jay's _always_ rushing back for a shower."

"Damn it!"

Jenson slammed his back into the shower knob, turning it off and skidded on the tile in his hurry to reach his room, narrowly avoiding the door frame. "Fuck, fuck, fuck; that's _cold_ and where are my _pants_!"

"There are children, Jenson!"

"Sorry-pants!"

Jenson fairly dove over his cot to grab at his one pair of clean jeans-he'd have to wash the rest tonight, oh, what a bother-and shrugged into his shirt as he pulled them on. "Oh, _Jesus_, _jacket-_-"

"Jay! Your jacket's downstairs!"

"Thank you!" he called back from under his bed-ah, _there's_ his boots; he never really remembered anything in the mad scramble to get to his shower. He probably had thirty seconds left to get to the mines.

"Carly," he shouted down the stairs, "can you just toss my coat out onto the front steps? I'll take the window."

"Jay-!"

But Jenson was already ducking and rolling and on his feet again with nothing but an aching shoulder-a significant improvement from his last attempt at window-jumping. His bright orange miner's uniform lay neatly at the front steps and he called out a fond "Thank you!" before rushing back down the beaten track to the caves.

"There you are," Carter breathed from the side of his mouth as Jenson skidded into line. "I thought you wouldn't make it."

Jenson shrugged. "It was fine."

Carter looked as though he were about to speak, but their young gym leader called for attention. "Miners!" Roark said, and then paused. "I-I know we haven't been battling lately. I know you're all itching for a fight, and-there haven't been enough trainers-enough young trainers willing to take the first steps."

"Got that right," Carter muttered from Jenson's left. "No one's come by since that last trainer, who..."

Jenson remembered. Jenson hadn't been working in the gym at that time, but he had heard from the mines themselves, and chattering away with the shovels and picks, how Roark had lost for the first time in years. And how Roark trained and trained but could not make it up to himself.

Now Roark looked excited. A rare gleam shone in his eyes, reflected from his glasses, and his hair looked like fire in the morning light. "Rowan called," he announced, and the miners began to titter. Rowan, the famous pokemon researcher, bothered with simple miners, no, a simple _gym_ like them? "And he said," Roark continued, overriding the murmurs, "that a trainer was coming."

Jenson wasn't sure what to make of that, and from the sudden lull in voices, the other miners didn't either.

This might not have been big news. Except... except all of them were bored. All of them were tired. Working in the mines wasn't really exciting business, and all of them, all of them were trainers at heart. Battling geodues versus geodudes wasn't exciting business. Battling machops against geodudes even less, so perhaps all the pomp and circumstance was necessary.

Yes, Jenson thought, let's see what this baby trainer can bring to the table.

* * *

R&R!


End file.
